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Our defense was bad but, i was actually expecting them to look pretty bad against the Eagles and Pack. We may have an improved secondary but, those spread offenses are going to give us trouble early on. I wouldnt use these next two games as a barometer of what our defense will be. It certainly was ugly, though.

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Our defense was bad but, i was actually expecting them to look pretty bad against the Eagles and Pack. We may have an improved secondary but, those spread offenses are going to give us trouble early on. I wouldnt use these next two games as a barometer of what our defense will be. It certainly was ugly, though.

Any clue on WHY IN THE HELL we hardly blitzed or used press coverage? God, McNabb had all day to throw, and those three step drop backs always succeeded with their short routes. And we seriously need to cool it with all the damn face mask penalties.

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I cant give you any answers on why we didnt do this or that. All I know is that, that offense is extremely difficult to game plan against. With Westbrook constantly moving around, Mcnabb's excellent awareness and mobility, and now Jackson. Like the Pats and Packers, those spread offenses are so dangerous...it's never an easy task to stop them, atleast we did manage to do just that at the most important time of the game.

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Yeah the defense didn't play that well, but stepped up in the final minutes.
Anyway, of the 37 points allowed, only 23 were allowed by the defense (Romo fumble in the endzone and that absurd PI call).
We got beat deep only once, we sacked McNabb 4 times but we could have sacked him 8 times (if only we were able to bring him down). So, not great performance by the defense but some things to be optimistic about, considering that Philly has one of the best offense (at the moment) we'll face the entire year.

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I don't think you guys are giving enough credit to how good that offense is. A healthy McNabb with Westbrook in that kind of offense is pretty nasty. Also we might as well have gift wrapped 14 of those points.

How bout our rookies stepping up. Felix played a hell of a game. Also Jenkins made on hell of a play on that pass break up. Bennett with the nice TE screen. Wow I am just pumped right now.

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Great night to be a Cowboy fan, what a tough hard fought win, I would of been pissed all week if we blew it, just a few thoughts.

- How bout that rookie class? Man, Felix came up huge with a special teams TD and great field position on the rest of them, Jenkins made his presence felt by tipping a would be TD pass, Bennett started the game and made a huge grab down the sideline later in the game, we really do have some contributors with this class and I'm becoming more of a fan with each passing week.

- The defense in general did play bad, an elite defense doesn't let teams score 40 points those are just the facts no way around it, but when it came down to it that upgraded secondary paid huge dividends...Their were no passing lanes on that final drive and thats a good feeling because last year that would of been a TD drive.

- Jason Garrett>Jim Johnson...He called an excellent game, beginning to end, and Romo just flourishes in his offense, its really something special to watch, all that talk about how we need another WR yet we can still 40 points any given week with injured WR's...We made adjustments to TO getting shut down and managed to outscore them 17-7 in the 2nd half, the things I love to see from him, only a matter of time before Garrett takes over.

- With that being said, a Wade Phillips teams just has too many penalties and is too undisciplined, we see the same thing week after week, some coaches put more emphasis on this and demand better, we go out every week and shoot ourselves in the foot and rely on ability to dig us out of holes, that won't cut it in the playoffs...Garrett would change all that, I get that feel from watching him in practice and seeing how he runs the team, he acts more like the HC anyway.

We have some things to work on with the defense, I need to see more pressure, and earlier in the game, thats why we have all these corners, Spencer is back, so unleash these guys...Run some delayed blitzes up the middle, Mcnabb was breaking free too many times, we dialed it up late but if we did that early we don't give him time to look deep...Good to see Austin, Newman, Spencer, and Burnett all out there and active.

I agree Zach and Hamlin are taking over on defense, what Thomas gives us this year is priceless, Roy still showed he can get beat on 1st downs so depending on this injury its Watkins chance to start again...He did make a very nice pass breakup earlier that Avant ended up catching.

Originally posted by Scott Wright

I guarantee that if someone picks Cam Newton in the Top 5 they will regret it.

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The pass rush wasnt all that bad to be honest. It wasnt a consistant rush but, we could have had a good 6-7 sacks if it wasnt Mcnabb back there. He was brilliant tonight. Ellis and Ratliff should have had him a few times but, he's just so damn big and mobile. Props to him. He's back and more dangerous than ever. Of the three other teams in the division...i'd go as far as saying, a healthy Mcnabb is the scariest player in the division.

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I have confidence in Watkins, he has started before at least, we have to see if his ball skills have improved because for a guy his height he should be knocking alot of passes down and I remember lots of passes going over his head before...I guess we really get to see if we get better or worse without Roy.

Originally posted by Scott Wright

I guarantee that if someone picks Cam Newton in the Top 5 they will regret it.

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I have confidence in Watkins, he has started before at least, we have to see if his ball skills have improved because for a guy his height he should be knocking alot of passes down and I remember lots of passes going over his head before...I guess we really get to see if we get better or worse without Roy.

Watkins was active tonight. Love the hit he made to blast the ball out of the hands of (forget who that WR was). Hated his face mast penalty. Overall, some good and some bad. He even made a special teams tackle. I can't wait to see how we are w/out Roy. Finally some decisions can be made.

Roy looked so slow and fat trying to catch up with Desean on that bomb.

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Great game, and I sincerely hope people don't fall back on the easy "we played pathetic defense" refrain. That Eagle team was sharp tonight. It looked like we were playing good coverage in that first half, but our pressure was too erratic. On the plays where we blanketed their receivers, he either a) had a ton of time or b)if our guys got there, made on amazing escape after another. In the second half our rush started to wear them down and--while he still made several plays by avoiding them--we began disrupting his rhythm.

And in response to your comment about elite defenses not giving up 40 points, LonghornsLegend, I wanted to make a few points. In the first place, they had 37, of which a minimum of 7 cannot be attributed to the defense. So that's 30, not 40. Some would claim that Romo's TO should not be counted against them, and I might agree, with the caveat that after that TO an elite defense should find a way to at least hold them to a FG more often than not, if not force a TO of their own. Sadly, we won't know how our guys responded because we got jobbed on that PI call in the end zone. (sidenote: is that the worst PI call you have ever seen? I mean, its one thing if its just not any contact, but when you are literally being held into the receiver and aren't capable of leaving him alone if you wanted to and you then get called for it, that is beyond the term "blown call". Henry needs to work on his technique, quit grabbing WRs hands with his jersey. Back to my point)

So, whether you think it is 30 or 23, I would like to present for your consideration some data on the Cowboy's SB defenses. In 92 Dallas got their asses handed to them on MNF by this same Eagles team, allowing 31 points in a blowout loss. They finished 1st overall in defense and won the SB. In 93 they allowed 35 points to what would end up being a bad Redskin team on opening night. To make matters worse, they were in a tight spot and needed a tough defensive effort to help them make up for the absence of Emmitt Smith. Didn't matter, they got blown out again, and by a bad team to boot, they later gave up 27 point in a game. In 94 they allowed a 31 point outing. In 95 they allowed 27 points in one game and then let the '9ers put 38 on them in what was supposed to be a statement game....and that's a Niner team missing its HOF QB in Steve Young, who was replaced by Elvis effing Grbac.

All of these teams had elite defenses. All were Super Bowl quality teams. All had occasional bad games.

Part of it, imo, is that when you have an explosive offense, no matter how great that D is, the other team feels more pressure to put points on the board, and their offense plays with a greater sense of urgency. Sometimes this results in TO-laden games and blowouts. Other times your defense gets beaten up a little.

Either way, I'm certainly not saying that Dallas has done enough to be considered an elite defense. What I am saying is that this game, by itself, means little either way. As the season progresses, the pattern will emerge, and we will know whether this was part of a big time flaw in our personnel/scheme/mindset/et al or if it was simply another great offense getting theirs.

It should be noted, however, that we held Westbrook to a 3 ypc game, and only McNabbs scrambles make their our run defense look anything less than dominant. Pass wise, they didn't even break the 8 YPA barrier (Romo posted a 10.4), so its not like we got torched or anything. They, specifically McNabb, were excellent. Give them the credit. We threw some punches, got a few bad calls and bad bounces, and ultimately got the W.

Originally posted by 21ST

He was protecting his self

Originally posted by tjsunstein

From what? His leg?

Originally posted by Paranoidmoonduck

That leg has had it out for him since day 1.

"We're the quiet guys, the guys before the storm. And then we hit you."

DeMarcus Ware

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I agree with DMW about the defense: they allowed 23, not 37. One TD was a fumble recovered by the Eagles, and another TD was after a turnover with the ball placed on the 1 yard line because of a poor call.
So 23 is not great but not that bad. But the thing we must consider is that we allowed only 7 in the second half. It means that our coaching staff made good adjustments during half-time, just like last week, props to them. If you also consider that we extended some of their drives with stupid penalties (we had what, 30 face mask calls?)...
TO was kept quiet in the second half, but Witten killed them. On the first half they focused on stopping Witten and Barber and TO got loose, they adjusted during halftime and focused on TO (and he had a big catch called back because of a holding penalty by Procter), so it was Witten time to got loose. I do believe that no team can control both of them. You just can keep in check one, the other is gonna make you pay. The only one who can stop both of them is Romo.

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I agree with everyone saying that the defense didn't allow all of those points, but i can't believe no one was making a bigger deal on the DeSean Jackson play where he let go of the ball. There needs to be some adjusting on that rule, or have some damn referees that can get the call right the first time. That was another seven point swing that went against us.

I really hope we let Felix be the full-time KR. He was beasting on every single KR. Our offense scored almost at will, in large part to the short field we had to work with thanks to Jones.

Also, in reference to the Watkins face mask, why the hell can't they call it both ways? Westbrook had a fist full of mask prior to Watkins dragging him down. There needs to be some adjusting to that as well. And the damn phantom PI call. Seriously, there was some horrendous calls yesterday. Including a holding on the first Westbrook touchdown that went unnoticed.

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Great game, and I sincerely hope people don't fall back on the easy "we played pathetic defense" refrain. That Eagle team was sharp tonight. It looked like we were playing good coverage in that first half, but our pressure was too erratic. On the plays where we blanketed their receivers, he either a) had a ton of time or b)if our guys got there, made on amazing escape after another. In the second half our rush started to wear them down and--while he still made several plays by avoiding them--we began disrupting his rhythm.

And in response to your comment about elite defenses not giving up 40 points, LonghornsLegend, I wanted to make a few points. In the first place, they had 37, of which a minimum of 7 cannot be attributed to the defense. So that's 30, not 40. Some would claim that Romo's TO should not be counted against them, and I might agree, with the caveat that after that TO an elite defense should find a way to at least hold them to a FG more often than not, if not force a TO of their own. Sadly, we won't know how our guys responded because we got jobbed on that PI call in the end zone. (sidenote: is that the worst PI call you have ever seen? I mean, its one thing if its just not any contact, but when you are literally being held into the receiver and aren't capable of leaving him alone if you wanted to and you then get called for it, that is beyond the term "blown call". Henry needs to work on his technique, quit grabbing WRs hands with his jersey. Back to my point)

So, whether you think it is 30 or 23, I would like to present for your consideration some data on the Cowboy's SB defenses. In 92 Dallas got their asses handed to them on MNF by this same Eagles team, allowing 31 points in a blowout loss. They finished 1st overall in defense and won the SB. In 93 they allowed 35 points to what would end up being a bad Redskin team on opening night. To make matters worse, they were in a tight spot and needed a tough defensive effort to help them make up for the absence of Emmitt Smith. Didn't matter, they got blown out again, and by a bad team to boot, they later gave up 27 point in a game. In 94 they allowed a 31 point outing. In 95 they allowed 27 points in one game and then let the '9ers put 38 on them in what was supposed to be a statement game....and that's a Niner team missing its HOF QB in Steve Young, who was replaced by Elvis effing Grbac.

All of these teams had elite defenses. All were Super Bowl quality teams. All had occasional bad games.

Part of it, imo, is that when you have an explosive offense, no matter how great that D is, the other team feels more pressure to put points on the board, and their offense plays with a greater sense of urgency. Sometimes this results in TO-laden games and blowouts. Other times your defense gets beaten up a little.

Either way, I'm certainly not saying that Dallas has done enough to be considered an elite defense. What I am saying is that this game, by itself, means little either way. As the season progresses, the pattern will emerge, and we will know whether this was part of a big time flaw in our personnel/scheme/mindset/et al or if it was simply another great offense getting theirs.

It should be noted, however, that we held Westbrook to a 3 ypc game, and only McNabbs scrambles make their our run defense look anything less than dominant. Pass wise, they didn't even break the 8 YPA barrier (Romo posted a 10.4), so its not like we got torched or anything. They, specifically McNabb, were excellent. Give them the credit. We threw some punches, got a few bad calls and bad bounces, and ultimately got the W.

your right about the points our defense actually let them score, but I'm just trying to look at improvements instead of always patting us on the back for everything, these games are important to get home field but we have to be solid all around to win playoff games, we just can't keep relying on our talent to bail us out all the time...Alot of that was Mcnabb your right, he moved around and made throws, but I wanted too see more pressure turn into more turnovers especially with Spencer and Newman both out there.

We played very good last night, but it wasn't a perfect day in the neighborhood, I don't just want to settle anymore, and we need to be alot sharper if we want to beat either the Giants or the Eagles come playoff time...Desean Jackson did run right down the middle of the field on that TD, its ok to say we need to improve in some areas instead of just looking at the positives...You want to come out of a game and see what you did wrong and improve on it.

Originally posted by Scott Wright

I guarantee that if someone picks Cam Newton in the Top 5 they will regret it.